Gertrude Michael
Acting • Born 1911-06-01 – Died 1964-12-31
Biography
Gertrude Michael (June 1, 1911, Talladega, Alabama – December 31, 1964, Beverly Hills, California) was an American film, stage and television actress. Born as Lillian Gertrude Michael in Talladega, Alabama, she reportedly graduated from high school at the age of 14. She became a radio singer on the radio. She attended the University of Alabama and Converse College, Cincinnati. Her childhood home in Talladega, Alabama was destroyed by fire in 2007. In 1929 in Cincinnati she made her stage debut in a stock company. She subsequently appeared on Broadway in Rachel Crothers' Caught Wet (1931). She entered the movies playing Richard Arlen's finaceé in Wayward (1932), but her best-remembered role is probably as Rita Ross in Murder at the Vanities (1934), one of the last pre-Code films, in which she sang an ode to marijuana (Sweet Marijuana). She had an affair with writer Paul Cain (aka Peter Ruric).After they broke up, Cain wrote the role of the alcoholic lover (based on Michael) in his only novel published during his lifetime, Fast One. Gertrude Michael died, aged 53, from undisclosed causes, in Beverly Hills, California. Description above from the Wikipedia article Gertrude Michael,licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
Filmography
63 credits
Women's Prison
Movie • 1955
Chief Matron Sturgess
Flamingo Road
Movie • 1949
Millie
I'm No Angel
Movie • 1933
Alicia Hatton
Hidden Power
Movie • 1939
Virginia Garfield
Caged
Movie • 1950
Georgia Harrison
Second Wife
Movie • 1936
Virginia Howard
Allotment Wives
Movie • 1945
Gladys Smith
Ann Vickers
Movie • 1933
Mona Dolphin
Cleopatra
Movie • 1934
Calpurnia
No Escape
Movie • 1953
Olga Valerie Lewis
The Continental Twist
Movie • 1961
Letitia Clunker
Murder at the Vanities
Movie • 1934
Rita Ross
The Last Outpost
Movie • 1935
Rosemary Haydon
Bugles in the Afternoon
Movie • 1952
May
Four Hours to Kill!
Movie • 1935
Mrs. Sylvia Temple
Three's a Crowd
Movie • 1945
Sophie Whipple
Make Way for a Lady
Movie • 1936
Miss Eleanor Emerson
Sophie Lang Goes West
Movie • 1937
Sophie Lang
Night of Terror
Movie • 1933
Sarah Rinehart
Women in Bondage
Movie • 1943
District Director Schneider
Murder on the Blackboard
Movie • 1934
Jane Davis
Cradle Song
Movie • 1933
Marcella
Bolero
Movie • 1934
Lady D'Argon
Where Are Your Children?
Movie • 1943
Nell Wilson
Mr. Dodd Takes the Air
Movie • 1937
Jessica Stafford
Till We Meet Again
Movie • 1936
Elsa Duranyi
The Witching Hour
Movie • 1934
Margaret Price
The Return of Sophie Lang
Movie • 1936
Sophie Lang
Unashamed
Movie • 1932
Marjorie
Father Brown, Detective
Movie • 1934
Evelyn Fischer
Search for Beauty
Movie • 1934
Jean Strange
A Bedtime Story
Movie • 1933
Louise
It Happened in New York
Movie • 1935
Vania Nardi
Slightly Tempted
Movie • 1940
Duchess
Menace
Movie • 1934
Helen Chalmers
George White's Scandals
Movie • 1934
Miss Lee
Parole Fixer
Movie • 1940
Collette Menthe
Prisoner of Japan
Movie • 1942
Toni Chase
The Farmer's Daughter
Movie • 1940
Clarice Sheldon
Faces in the Fog
Movie • 1944
Nora Brooks
I Can't Give You Anything But Love, Baby
Movie • 1940
Magda Delys
Woman Trap
Movie • 1936
Barbara 'Buff' Andrews
Hold That Girl
Movie • 1934
Dorothy Lamont
Behind Prison Walls
Movie • 1943
Elinor Cantwell
Just like a Woman
Movie • 1939
Ann Heston
Darling, How Could You!
Movie • 1951
Mrs. Rossiter
Wayward
Movie • 1932
Mary Morton
Pound Foolish
Movie • 1940
Mrs. Irene Reynolds
The Notorious Sophie Lang
Movie • 1934
Sophie Lang
I Believed in You
Movie • 1934
Pamela Banks
Sailor Be Good
Movie • 1933
Kay Whitney
Club Havana
Movie • 1945
Hetty - Powder Room Attendant
Star of the Circus
Movie • 1938
Yester
Forgotten Faces
Movie • 1936
Cleo / Harry's wife
Perry Mason
TV • 1957
Helen Rucker
Hallmark Hall of Fame
TV • 1951
Sea Hunt
TV • 1958
Schlitz Playhouse of Stars
TV • 1951
The Duchess
The 20th Century Fox Hour
TV • 1955
Cavalcade of America
TV • 1952
Major Pauline Cushman
Schlitz Playhouse of Stars
TV • 1951
Four Star Playhouse
TV • 1952
Fanny
The Case of the Dangerous Robin
TV • 1960
Kay Salisbury